Remember earlier when we said that most point spread bets in basketball pay out at -110? Well, this is where the vig is located. Sportsbooks will work to get equal amounts of money on both sides of a game and make their money off of the vig. If they are successful in doing so, it does not matter to them who wins the game. For example, let's look at our earlier example. Here are what the odds would look like at the sportsbook:
Another popular form of golf betting involves matchup propositions, in which two golfers are paired against each other in a head-to-head wager, with a betting line on each golfer set by the oddsmaker. The golfer with the better (lower) score wins the matchup. (If one golfer continues play in the tournament after his opponent misses the cut, the golfer who continues play wins the matchup.)
How the point spread works - When two teams meet on the playing field or on the basketball court, one team is typically better than the other or in a more favorable position because of factors like playing at home. If all you had to do were pick the winning team in a game, everybody would simply wager on the best team or the home team in a even matchup and bypass all the lines and collect their winnings at a high rate.
Sports betting is not just about being able to pick out the winner and loser of a game. Because of the various different bet types, there is a lot of different strategies that goes into how you approach them. Point spread bets are no different. One of the biggest tips we can offer is to make sure that you fully understand what you are betting on. A great pick is only great if you actually put your money behind it correctly. Thankfully, this guide should have you fully prepared for that.

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You should already know that the Eagles are the favorite to win and that you should expect less than even money on a correct pick here. You should also know that the Falcons are the favorite, and you should expect better than even money on a correct pick here. Having this in mind every time before you start your calculations will protect you from making a mistake and calculating the completely wrong direction.
We mentioned we would touch on the -3500 bet in this section. If you calculate the implied probability of -3500, you see that it is 97.2%. This means that the bet will have to hit 97.2% of the time for you to break even. Now, if you think that the bet is actually 100%, then it might be a smart bet to make. You’re still going to have to put up a lot of money to see any real sort of profit, which might not be desirable based on your personal preferences.
Is there value there? Yes. Are you going to make money off that bet? Well, it depends. If you’re only able to make a bet like this once, then you’re most likely going to lose. In order to realize that value, you’ll need to be in a lot of similar opportunities. If you have a very long-term betting strategy, then you can probably get away with making this bet. But if you’re looking for some more regular profit, you might want to steer clear of this. The odds say that the team is only going to win the game a little under 3 times for every 100 times they play. There is value there, but it depends on your betting strategy if you want to make that bet.
Moneylines are a viable alternative to point spreads when betting on football. If you're one of those bettors who only ever bets on the spread, then you could very well be missing out on some good opportunities to find better value. We don't recommend that you stop placing point spreads and only place moneyline wagers, but you should definitely consider both when betting on a game of football. Try to decide which one offers the better value, and then go with that option.
Let’s take a quick step back and talk about what the sportsbook’s goal is with any game they are offering action on. Ideally, the sportsbook wants to take the perfect amount of action (money bet) on each side of a game so that regardless of who wins, they make money. Their profit comes from taking a small percentage off of the top as a house fee for facilitating the action.
The way the sportsbook does this is by putting out a betting line that is based on how many points they think the better team is going to win by. This is a lot like how our older siblings would "spot us" a few points when we played each other in basketball as kids. For example, let's say that Florida Gators are playing the Arkansas Razorbacks. Let's also say that Florida is the better team and the sportsbook thinks they are going to win the game by seven points. They can't just let everyone bet evenly, or everyone would bet Florida and clean them out. Enter the point spread. The sportsbook would set the point spread on this game at -7 for Florida to win. The negative sign before the number signifies that this team is the favorite to win. This means that if you want to bet on Florida, they have to win by more than 7 points for you to win your bet.
The negative (-) sign indicates that the Cowboys are the favorites, while the positive (+) sign indicates that the New York Giants are the underdogs. With the spread set at 2.5 points, a bet on the Cowboys would mean that they would have to win by more than 2.5 points (3 or more) in order for you to win that bet. A bet on New York would mean that the Giants would have to either lose by 2.5 or less points (2 or less) or win the game outright in order for your bet to win.
The money line bet is the simplest form of betting in the industry. A “money line” bet is a way of betting on which team is going to win the game outright, or which individual will win an event. With a money line bet, the margin of victory or the total number of points a team scores do not matter. If you like the Patriots to win outright versus the Browns, a 3-0 win would win you just as much money as a 77-0 win.
For example, let’s say you’re thinking about betting on something that is -3500. You are almost 100% sure that you’re going to win this bet. If you bet $100 on this bet, you’re going to see a profit of $2.86. Again, this might be worth it to you. An almost 3% return on a sure thing might be something that you’re interested in. However, if you’re looking to make any meaningful profit, you’re going to have to risk a lot of money. To win $100, you’re going to have to risk $3500.
This is because different bookmakers and betting sites price up games differently. So the odds they offer are not always the same. Remember the Packers versus Cardinals game we showed earlier as an example? We used the actual odds from a real betting site for that example. The following odds were also available for the same game, from various other sites.
Overtime and the shoot-out does count for NHL point-spread results in Ontario. Whenever you see a game -0.5 essentially both teams have a spread of -0.5 and your team has to win the game for you to win the bet. Lately there have been more -1.0 / +1.0 NHL spreads in Ontario. If you choose the -1.0 spread and the game goes to overtime you cannot win the bet. You can only push the bet if your team wins in overtime or the shoot-out. Conversely, if you choose the +1.0 spread and the game goes to overtime you cannot lose the bet but will push the bet if your team loses in overtime or the shoot-out.

A lot of people who are new to online betting aren’t aware of prop bets, because a lot of brick-and-mortar sportsbooks just don’t have the resources to allow them. These bets are a great way for you to make some extra money off of predictions that might not have a direct outcome on the winner of the game. For example, let’s say you think that the Warriors are going to shoot lights out from the field, but you think for some reason they aren’t going to get a lot of looks and are going to lose the game. Your only option without prop bets would be to bet on the team they are playing against, but that might not be a great value bet.

If you bet $100 on the Magic, you would get $105 in return. If you bet $100 on the Mavericks, you would get $90.91 in return. You might be asking yourself why they aren’t paying out the same amount on both sides of the game. The reason is that the difference is the house rake. Sometimes referred to as the vig or the juice, this is the small percentage that the sportsbook takes off the top for facilitating the action. The percentage that the house takes will vary, and different sides of the bet will pay for it.

The point spread - also called "the line" or "the spread" - is used as a margin to handicap the favorite team. For betting purposes, the oddsmaker predicts that the favored team will win by a certain number of points. This number of points is the point spread. The favorite is always indicated by a minus sign (e.g. -5.5) and the underdog by a plus sign (e.g.+5.5). If you bet on the favorite, you win your bet if the favorite wins AND their margin of victory is greater than the point spread. If you bet on the underdog, you win if the underdog wins, ties, or if the favored team wins but fails to exceed the point spread. It is standard for point spread bets in most sports that you wager $110 to win $100.
Sports betting has become a popular pastime and with the offering of many online sportsbooks, punters from all over the world can engage in exciting betting action and can have amazing opportunities to collect payouts. There are many different types of bets that are supported at betting sites and most punters will be familiar with moneyline and spread bets. These are the two most popular betting options for experienced punters, so they are options at just about every operating sportsbook.
This is a type of betting line which lays out the amount a player must wager in order to win $100.00, or the amount the player wins on a wager of $100.00. There is no point spread or handicap in this line. In order to win a moneyline bet, the team wagered on simply has to win the game. Payoffs are based on true odds rather than fixed odds. The amount the player lays or takes may vary from game to game.
The money line bet is the simplest form of betting in the industry. A “money line” bet is a way of betting on which team is going to win the game outright, or which individual will win an event. With a money line bet, the margin of victory or the total number of points a team scores do not matter. If you like the Patriots to win outright versus the Browns, a 3-0 win would win you just as much money as a 77-0 win.

Because the spread is intended to create an equal number of wagers on either side, the implied probability is 50% for both sides of the wager. To profit, the bookmaker must pay one side (or both sides) less than this notional amount. In practice, spreads may be perceived as slightly favoring one side, and bookmakers often revise their odds to manage their event risk.